Andrew Phillips and his wife, Amber, were watching an online worship service last Sunday when a terrible storm hit their community of Moss, Mississippi.  Andrew, a volunteer firefighter, started tracking the weather on his fire radio and online.  When the tornado warning sounded, Andrew hurried his family – his wife and their two small children, ages 2 and 6 months – into a closet in their home.  Andrew saw the funnel cloud outside, grabbed some pillows from his bedroom, and rushed into the closet to shield his family.

“I was in there about 20 seconds when it hit,” Andrew told the Associated Press.

The tornado obliterated their home, all except the closet in which the family had taken refuge.  The closet is actually a safe-room, made out of concrete blocks, that doubles as a closet.  The safe-room was one of the reasons the Phillips had recently purchased the home.  The home was equipped with the FEMA-approved safe-room which, according to the organization, is a “hardened structure specifically designed to meet FEMA criteria and provide life-safety protection in extreme wind, including tornadoes and hurricanes.”  Because they had taken refuge in the safe-room, the four of them survived without a scratch. *

There is only one eternally secure place that will survive the storms of this life and the judgment of God upon sin.  That safe place is “in Christ Jesus.”  “In Christ” is an often used phrase in Scripture that describes the saving relationship that one has with God when one has accepted God’s offer of salvation and eternal life on His terms.

“In Christ” is where all spiritual blessings are found (Ephesians 1:3).  “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).  “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Ephesians 1:7).  We are “justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24).  “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ” (Ephesians 2:13).  “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17).

How do we get “in Christ,” the only eternally secure place?  How do we form this relationship with God through His Son Jesus?

God took the initiative.  Sin separates us from God, but God loves us so much that He gave His Son to die on the cross for our sins (John 3:16).  If we accept His offer of salvation and eternal life on His terms, He places us “in Christ.”

We accept God’s offer by placing our faith and trust in Jesus (Acts 16:30-31), turning from our sins in repentance (Acts 17:30-31), confessing Jesus before men (Romans 10:9-10), and being baptized (immersed) into Christ for the forgiveness of our sins (Acts 2:38).

The Apostle Paul reminded the Christians in Rome of how they came to be “in Christ”: “Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death?  Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:3-4).

Later he reminded these Christians of their security in Christ: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus… who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit” (Romans 8:1,4).  As Christians walk in the light of His Word, the blood of Jesus continues to cleanse them from sin (1 John 1:7-9).

The storms are coming.  Are you in the truly eternally secure place in Christ?

-- David A. Sargent

* Information gleaned from “Mississippi family survives tornado inside concrete safe room as storm destroys 'everything'” by Travis Fedschun, www.foxnews.com

David A. Sargent, Minister

Church of Christ at Creekwood 
1901 Schillinger Rd. S.
Mobile, Alabama  36695

Archived issues of Living Water can be viewed and accessed from our website at: www.creekwoodcc.org